China threatens to detain soccer fans for swearing

BEIJING, Aug 3 (Reuters) Worried that loutish behaviour will shame the nation during next year's Beijing Olympics, police are threatening to detain fans who swear at a football match in the capital this weekend, as a way of stamping out the habit.

Police will be positioned at each stand filming the crowd at Sunday's Barcelona versus Beijing Guoan match, looking for evidence of swearing, fighting or throwing trash, the official Xinhua news agency said today.

''It is just way out of line to have 30,000 people shouting and swearing en masse,'' police spokesman Liu Chunjiang was quoted as saying. ''What we are trying to do is to give the right guidance in how to view a football match, not to impose anything on the spectators.'' In addition to being detained, badly behaved fans may be banned for 12 months from attending a football match, it said.

The police will use Sunday's match, which is expected to attract 30,000 fans, as a ''drill for next year's Olympics'', Liu added.

Beijingers are well-known in China for their willingness to inject particularly earthy expressions into their everyday speech.

The government is worried that swearing and other ''uncultured'' behaviour like spitting in public and pushing will embarrass the country at next year's Olympics, and has been running campaigns to get people to be more ''civilised''.

Reuters TB DB1827